Exposure, A Parable
by AlinaLotus
Summary: The best pleasures come after the worst pains...or from them. She really doesn't know. She doesn't know anything, actually.


**Probably the oddest pairing I've ever done, but I just started writing and this is what came out. Warnings are language, het and fslash sexual situations, and slight BDSM.**

Enjoy.

_...I never had all the answers  
I never had enough time  
but I sure had all the reasons  
why you weren't what I wanted to find_...

Luna doesn't have any answers--she leaves that for somebody else. She vaguely wishes she came off more clever and less batty than she does, but her mother always said to her, pale hair flapping in the wind, that apples are apples and oranges are oranges, and it's no use mixing the two. So she doesn't really mind if people think of her as loony, odd, because it's who she is and she simply won't--_can't_--change.

Pansy has all the answers, or so she's told. She's haughty and beautiful and cold, a perfect Slytherin princess, just like her daddy always said she would be, and her mother always warned her she better be. But what she really is, is scared. An idealistic girl trying to find something she isn't sure exists at all.

And then, one day, she sees Luna Lovegood--loony, off-her-effing-rocker Lovegood--prancing around the Lake, barefooted and looking so fucking free that it almost makes Pansy sick. Nothing's expected of Luna, nothing except madness and maybe a laugh or two. To be so...so..._unconcerned_, Pansy has no inkling, but every desire, to know what that is like.

As if sensing eyes on her, Luna looks up, her silver eyes meeting Pansy's and the electricity crackles through the air, an invisible but very real cord expanding from Pansy to her. Luna smiles, hair falling over her shoulders, and walks over to where Pansy is standing, beneath a large aspen tree.

They stare at each other for a moment, before Luna gives the smallest of sighs, stepping so close to Pansy that their hips are almost touching. Pansy doesn't move, doesn't think.

"I recognize that look." Luna says in very knowing way.

Pansy blinks. "What look?" She snaps, and a childish urge to put her hands on her hips grips her.

Luna chuckles. "Oh yes, that's the one. I know what you want, Pansy Adele Parkinson."

Pansy's eyes widen. "How do you know my middle name?" She certainly hasn't flaunted her dated middle name around school, so how is that Luna Lovegood, of all people, knows it?

"You don't have to be afraid; I want it too. You're very beautiful, after all. Aristocratic, you know. Your skin is quite tempting." Luna extends her hand, brushing Pansy's bicep with her knuckles.

Pansy knows she should react, do _something_, but Luna's hand is warm and delicate and it doesn't feel as bad as it should.

"I bet," Luna whispers, leaning in to Pansy so that now their lips are on centimeters away, and Pansy has the irrational pull to lean in, to kiss Luna's somehow alluring mouth, "That you have the loveliest breasts of any girl in Hogwarts." And Luna gets so close that for a split second their lips do touch, ghosting each other. Pansy really does lean in this time, pressing into Luna, the kiss short and pleasurable and more than confusing.

"That's it, Angel." Luna murmurs, because she'd let Pansy do anything to her, really, and she can't deny that she's wanted this for some time, ever since she saw Pansy crying behind the greenhouses, crying and tucked away from the rest of her house, the rest of the world. They are more alike than anybody could ever guess, and Luna longs for somebody to fill her life with.

Luna bites hard into Pansy's shoulder, and they shudder together. Pansy wants to say something, do something, but Luna is gone like a whirlwind, leaving her alone on the frosty grass.

* * *

Blaise wants to fuck her. He says so all the time, and his advances are more than bothersome. She lets him, though, because a girl has needs and though he is inexperienced and thinks he's better (and bigger, Pansy muses) than he really is, she's always been one to enjoy sex.

When he penetrates her, she closes her eyes, imagines his hair is long, that his hips curve deliciously. She tries to think that he smells like summer raspberries, and that if she lifted her lips to his, they would be pulled up into a far-away smile. Her body pulses as her fantasy takes flight--that Luna's body is above her, breasts full and stomach soft, mouth hot and hands everywhere.

She arches her back, wrapping her legs around Blaise's waist, fucking him with fervor. When she cums, she mentally cries _Luna, fucking hell Luna, _but has to bite her lip until she tastes blood to keep from saying it out loud.

* * *

She comes across Granger and the Weaselette in the corridor--hidden behind a large statue, shadows nearly concealing their actions. They are snogging like mad, clinging to each other like it's the only thing to do in the world.

Pansy's body feels on fire, watching these two girls who are so different, but attractive, she thinks, in their own way, though she'd rather curtsy to Snape than admit it. They're so involved in the moment, in each other, and Pansy longs to know what _that's_ all about.

She watches them a moment longer, her stomach tingling.

* * *

Luna's at a picnic, even though she's alone and it's only ten-thirty in the morning. She has put together quite a spread, bittersweet chocolate croissants and gooseberry-and-lime jelly, quiche with spinach and a jug of grapefruit juice.

They are all the favorite foods of Pansy Adele Parkinson, and Pansy will be joining her, though her upperclassman doesn't quite know it, at least not when she's in the kitchens putting together everything.

But five minutes after Luna has set out the blanket and gotten two plates and cups full, Pansy marches up the hill, looking every bit of her formidable, but no less than beautiful, self.

"Good morning." Luna says and gestures to the food across from her. "I'd hoped you come."

Pansy simply stands there, unmoving. _Doing everything while doing nothing, a woman's downfall_ _and her greatest strength_, her father always told her. He had such high hopes for her, for his prized little girl, but now that he's dead Pansy dreams in blood.

Luna knows this. Luna _is_ this.

"The juice is quite fresh." Luna takes a sip, lips puckering, to prove this.

Pansy is torn between kicking the plate of food at the lunatic girl before her (with blue robes like the sky and words like clouds) and kissing the crook of Luna's bare, ashen neck.

"Yes," Luna decides, reading Pansy's thoughts like she was a book lying open on the desk, "I'd like that too."

* * *

Luna reaches for the stars, wondering if she could touch them, would they be hard, sharp, hot. Pansy is like stars, she thinks.

Pansy watches, back against a tree stump, as Luna traces constellations with her finger tips. It's ridiculous in all aspects that she's even here--that she's spent the whole bleeding day with Lovegood. But there's something magnetic about Luna, and Pansy longs for intensity.

"What's your favorite?" Luna asks after a while.

Pansy tips her head back, eyes closed, and Luna doesn't know if she heard her. Luna lives there, in space, in swirling galaxies lit with millions of diamonds and rubies and opals. Pansy lives here, in the dirt and damp grass and has nothing to hold on to.

"Aries." Pansy whispers.

_"War and fire and the first, the strongest_." Luna recites, rolling onto her stomach and looking up at Pansy.

"A cardinal sign." Pansy says.

Luna nods, thinking it the most apt description of Pansy in the world.

* * *

"I've been made into something I'm not." Pansy blurts--it's the best explanation she can give for what she is (or isn't). Parkinsons are expectations and bloodlines, alliances and loyalties that were never real, never true. They simply followed power, followed those who were strong enough to maintain it. Pansy is like a china doll, painted and dressed a certain way. She cannot move unless somebody does it for her.

Luna gives her a serene smile, but doesn't say anything.

* * *

"Daddy is everything to me." Luna says simply, sitting beside Pansy on the shores of the Lake, folding her legs beneath her and settling into a meditative pose.

"My dad is dead." Pansy says and is surprised how the words taste coming out. They are angry and bitter, but most of all, defeated.

"Yes," Luna says, straightening her back, "I thought that was the case."

Pansy cocks an eyebrow. "You know some mad thing like my horrid middle name, but you weren't sure about my father?"

Luna shrugs. "Your middle name was a guess. You _look_ like a Pansy Adele, after all. Your dad, though...some things in your heart aren't so easy to read, Angel."

"And others are?" Pansy says, knocking their knees together as she tries to mimic Luna's pose.

"Quite. You're no killer, you hate the color black, and you're secretly afraid of skulls. You know, without the skin and eyes and all that."

Pansy shakes her head. "That's impossible. You can't know those things."

"Oh," Luna says, her eyes closed now, head tipped back to allow the Sun on her neck, "but I do."

"No," Pansy seethes, standing up, "you can't possibly know if somebody's a killer or not. The other things--alright, I'll give you those. But you try coming home to find the Dark Mark and the only person you've ever loved dead and not forming a fear of skulls."

Luna's hand shoots up, catching Pansy's wrist. Her fingers close around it, refusing to let go.

Pansy sighs and sits back down, pulling her knees up to her chest.

"I told you, you were no killer." Luna says again, almost in a reassuring way.

Pansy's eyes are closed, her forehead bent to her legs. "You lied."

* * *

Luna is tracing around her nipple. Her tongue is warm and Pansy never dreamed something like this, something that's been tainted by her experiences with men, could be so wonderful. She is moving slowly, memorizing and tasting each inch of the hardened rosebud pink area.

It all is happening in slow-motion, but that's for the best because Pansy doesn't want to miss one second of this. Luna is all nimble fingers and reverent lips, supple crevices and skin as translucent as the moon. As Luna's hand drifts to Pansy's thigh, she realizes she never wants this to end--but that is a fool's hope and if there is one thing Pansy isn't, it's a fool.

But still, she thinks (Luna parts her legs, presses feverish lips to Pansy's throbbing core) that no matter what happens, what wars tear them apart, she will never forget this. The best pleasures in life come after the worst pains...or from them. She doesn't really know. She doesn't know anything, actually, not about something so intimate and consensual. Finding the only love in her life murdered at the hands of those she was supposed to be able to trust, those that if they had asked, she would've put her life on the line for, has warped her into something damaged, something jarred and twisted. She never knew that it was possible to be made into something--not whole, but not entirely undone, either--else, something better. She has to wonder if this would be so meaningful, so satisfying, if she hadn't been ruined beforehand.

Pansy doesn't know when everything suddenly changed, and they went from being two different people to..._this_. It's not just the sex they have whenever they can, nor the meals spent watching each other at their respective tables. It isn't just Pansy's pulse ratcheted when she passes Luna in the hallway, exchanging so much in just a small, secret smile.

It's something else entirely and something that she couldn't--and probably shouldn't--put into words.

Luna is now tying her hands together with a black handkerchief. It's of high quality, Pansy can tell from how it feels against her skin. Luna ties it just tight enough to be on the verge of painful, trailing kisses around her wrists, lifting Pansy's arms above her head. They are alone in the Ravenclaw dorm, the door sealed from the inside.

"Such a lovely picture," Luna says with a content sigh. Pansy's skin is like porcelain, smooth and cold and flawless, her long hair blacker than the deepest of nights, but Luna's favorite part of Pansy is her lips. They are the color of roses, the color of shed blood, sensual and mockingly innocent. Words are tainted and masked with honey when they spill from those buxom lips, and Luna is always half hypnotized by them.

Pansy's nude body is angelic, though, in ways that Luna thinks only she can understand. She, with her fragmented thinking and sideways opinions of the world. Pansy is thoroughly unappreciated by the world at large because they don't see her with the dim moon and star light reflecting off her emerald-green eyes, don't feel the the warmth of her sculpted form against their own. They can't possibly understand that when Pansy is aroused, is_ needing, _she makes the most sublime sounds, moans and little pleas that are almost seraphic to Luna's ears. They wouldn't look close enough to see the half-smile Pansy lets escape when she watches the sun set, when the world turns from harsh light and is instead coated with the tranquil silence of darkness.

And how she tastes! Her jaw, her collar bones, the soft line of her stomach, the creamy folds of her womanhood. All are sweet like melted chocolate, like spun sugar. Luna could stay here for days, drinking Pansy in and eliciting those delightful sounds from her.

Luna reaches into velvet bag at the foot of her bed, pulls out another handkerchief, this time to be used as a blindfold. "We mustn't peek, precious." She says, lifting Pansy's head and securing the blindfold into place. She kisses Pansy fully on the mouth for a second, a gentle gesture that she hopes is reassuring in some way. Pain is pleasure, after all, they both know this, but the pain must come first and Luna would never truly hurt Pansy, not where it matters.

The tip of the knife is sharp, and Pansy tenses for a second when she realizes what Luna is going to do. But then she relaxes, because she can always take solace in pain. The blade slices across her skin, Luna drawing a circle around her belly button. She burns from the sensation, arching her back into the bittersweet pleasure. Her hands grip the bedsheets above her head, and she wants to beg for more.

Luna knows this. Luna _is _this.

"It's going to hurt." Luna whispers, but Pansy is desperate for this. Only in pain can she truly let go of everything, her inhibitions, her broken heart. She can let the pure blood (but her blood is dirtier than Granger's and grandeur is just an illusion anyway) flow from her body, ridding herself of all it carries and means.

But Luna gives her something else, something her body wants just as desperately as her mind does. The strap-on fits perfectly, cinched to her and when she presses the glass tip against Pansy's wet opening, Luna can feel herself being pulled in. Pansy bites down on her lip, immediately wrapping her legs around Luna's waist. It's almost ironic that she's had this fantasy almost exactly, and her orgasm nearly shatters her, the ends of Luna's hair brushing against her throat.

When the world is still again and Pansy's heart has slowed, Luna undoes the blindfold and unties Pansy's hands, and she kisses her longlingly, with all of her heart. Because this is the truth; Luna loves Pansy and always has, since she was eleven years old and saw Pansy's soul on her sleeve, saw her pain and dashed hopes in the form of pearly tears and a quivering (sensual, provocative) mouth.

Luna bends down and licks Pansy's navel, tasting her blood, which is no less sweet than any other part of. Pansy groans at the contact of Luna's tongue, and Luna's desire is on fire.

And they start the dance all over again, Pansy holding the knife this time, Luna writhing on the bed before her, explosions and stars behind silver eyes and her body quivers with release. Pansy hungrily, greedily touches her, tries to please her so she'll keep wanting more. Because this is the truth: Pansy loves Luna and always has, since the day she saw her across the grass, twirling without a damn care in the world, and even though Luna says she's no killer and Pansy will undoubtedly one day prove her wrong, she likes to live like this, like maybe she is a good girl and has something real about her, something that can be held on to.

Loved, Pansy hopes, not because of, but in spite of. Because her prejudices aren't her own and Parkinson is just her name, not something she is.

Understood, Luna hopes, not because of, but in spite of. Because her head is islands floating apart but she was raised that way and her dreams may be scattered but they include Pansy and maybe that's enough.

"_Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before_." Luna quotes softly under her breath, and Pansy, pressing her forehead against Luna's ribs, couldn't agree more.

****

As always, feedback is greatly appreciated. The lyrics from the beginning are from the song Tennesee by The Wreckers, and the quote above is by Edgar Allan Poe.


End file.
